The most recent wave of Yemeni displacement to Djibouti, against the backdrop of the accelerating events on Yemen's western coast, was not the first of its kind, nor is it merely a passing humanitarian situation imposed by the circumstances of the present conflict. It is the extension of a long history of contact, migration, and human intermingling between the two shores of Bab al-Mandeb.
Djibouti, small in its geographic area and economic means, has been large in embracing its neighbors, and wise in its handling of the region's crises and the world's upheavals. Despite the grave security, economic, and social burdens because of the waves of displacement, Djibouti has never abandoned its humanitarian responsibility, and has never closed its doors to those who came to it seeking safety and deliverance.
If we speak of the displacement of our brothers and kin from Yemen to Djibouti in times of conflict, modern history records successive waves: most prominently that of 2015, following the outbreak of the Yemeni crisis and the intensification of armed conflict; before it, the war of 1994, known as the war of secession; and likewise the developments of January 13, 1986 in southern Yemen.
But movement between the two shores was not tied to wars alone. Throughout its history the region has seen continuous Yemeni migrations from every part of Yemen - from its east, its north, its center, its south, and its western coast. People would take to the sea in simple wooden boats and cross the short distance between the two shores within hours, arriving in Djibouti, the African gateway facing Bab al-Mandeb.
Nor was the migration in one direction. Movement remained reciprocal between the two shores. When state institutions collapsed in Somalia at the beginning of the 1990s and hundreds of thousands of Somalis were forced to leave their homes, they took refuge in neighboring states, and many of them crossed the sea toward Yemen, where they found a safe haven and a humanitarian embrace.
So the peoples of the region continued to exchange shelter and support in times of hardship, each receiving the other whenever crises deepened. With the continuing movement between the two shores, customs and cultures intermingled, social bonds became interwoven, and ties of kinship and marriage arose, until intermarriage and human cohesion became natural and deep-rooted, renewing itself as life continues in this region.
The sea was no longer a barrier separating peoples. It became a bridge for contact, for coming to know one another, for the exchange of benefits, and for the shaping of a shared human memory.
In speaking of the history of migration in this region, one cannot pass over one of the greatest moments of Islamic history: the first and second migrations of the Companions of the Messenger of God, peace be upon him, to the land of Abyssinia, when they fled with their faith from persecution, and the Negus received them, gave them shelter, and honored their coming, refusing to hand them over to those who wished them harm.
That migration established enduring human meanings - in the relief of those who seek protection, in supporting the wronged, and in honoring the newcomer. These are values that have remained present among the peoples of the two shores of the Red Sea, inherited generation after generation and renewed whenever hardship befalls one of the region's peoples.
Returning to Djibouti's humanitarian role: the former Djiboutian interior minister told me that during the wave of Yemeni displacement in 2015, as the numbers of arrivals rose above 30,000 and external support and assistance were slow to arrive, the country's limited means came under great and mounting pressure.
Faced with this difficult situation, the minister thought it best to halt the reception of those arriving by sea temporarily. The president of the republic, Ismail Omar Guelleh, addressed him with deep human feeling, saying that his brother was at the door of his house in need of his help, and that he should not close his door - God would honor them by their helping him.
Those words were not merely an administrative instruction for handling an emergency. They were a sincere expression of a state's conscience, and the embodiment of a system of values that Djibouti has believed in, leadership and people alike: that a neighbor is not abandoned in hardship, and that humanitarian duty rises above narrow means and the calculations of circumstance.
At that point the entire Djiboutian people came forward, led by the First Lady, Kadra Mahamoud Haid, to offer aid, relief, and shelter to their Yemeni brothers, in a scene that embodied the depth of the fraternal and historical bonds between the two peoples.
History also recorded in that period a positive stance by the sisterly Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, through the King Salman Humanitarian Aid and Relief Center, among whose earliest works was the establishment of a shelter for the displaced in the Djiboutian city of Obock, the country's gateway overlooking Bab al-Mandeb, which contributed to strengthening Djibouti's capacity to receive the displaced and to provide them with care and protection.
Displacement to Djibouti was not confined to our Yemeni brothers alone. With every conflict or humanitarian catastrophe the region has witnessed, the country has received displaced people and refugees from Somalia, Ethiopia, Eritrea, and other neighboring states. Each time, Djibouti shared with them what it possessed, despite the limits of its resources and means, understanding that neighborhood is not merely a set of borders drawn on maps, but a moral and humanitarian responsibility, a shared destiny imposed by geography and confirmed by history.
States are not measured by the breadth of their territory alone, or by the size of their wealth or the number of their people. They are measured as well by their positions in times of hardship, and by their capacity to stand up for the human being when the ways close around him. From this angle, Djibouti has proved repeatedly that it is a state large in its positions, rich in the values of its people, and firm in its commitment toward its regional surroundings.
It was Djibouti's destiny, by virtue of the deeply important strategic position God granted it, to be a gateway between Africa and the Arabian Peninsula, and to stand at the heart of one of the most important maritime passages in the world. But it chose to make of this position, alongside its political and economic importance, a bridge of brotherhood and solidarity, an oasis of security and stability, and a refuge for those whose homelands have closed in on them.
